What's that word

8 Mar 2017 • Articles

What’s that word?

A brief guide to the strange words that sometimes pop up. I’m sure many people have been quietly contemplating a bible reading when someone in the pew behind them whispers: ‘Who’s Felicity?’ Now you have the answer.

Almsgiving – Charity. ‘To give alms’, is to give help.

Apologetics – the art of persuading people to accept the Christian faith, and defending it from detractors. It has nothing to do with apologizing.

Arrow prayers – are short requests, often memorized bible verses, uttered aloud or silently when doing something else, like an arrow shot into heaven.

Casuistry – the art of applying moral principles to particular cases of conscience, when the bible’s teaching and commandments cannot be directly applied to every problem. e.g. situation ethics.Catechisms – a method of teaching the faith by means of question and answer.

Dogma – is doctrine coming from ‘revelation’ and defined by the church as incontrovertibly true.Eschatology – is study of the ‘last things’, the biblical teaching about the events at the end of the world.

Exegesis – the art of drawing the meaning out of bible texts.

Felicity – ‘Happiness’, not a person. Heresies – beliefs different to those of the world-wide Church. 

Kenosis – the renunciation of the divine nature. It is a theory that suggests that Jesus, although he shares in eternity the attributes of God, including omnipotence and omniscience, voluntarily deprived himself of those things during the years when he lived as a man on earth.

Parousia – the second coming of Christ.Prodigality – wastefulness, the squandering of money and goods.

Tabernacle – literally a tent, but a special one. Also can be a special box in which is kept the sacrament during transportation.

Tetragammaton – the Hebrew name for God, in four letters: ‘YHWH’. Articulated as ‘Jehovah’.

Tithe – one tenth of annual earnings or produce. Taken as tax by the Church or to be ‘given to God’.

Usury – taking any interest on a loan!